


die for you, live for you

by lavenderhaze



Category: SEVENTEEN (Band)
Genre: Demisexual!Jihoon, M/M, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-22
Updated: 2017-05-22
Packaged: 2018-11-03 01:35:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,432
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10956951
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lavenderhaze/pseuds/lavenderhaze
Summary: Jeonghan once asked him how he writes all these love songs when he's never been truly in love. They had been tired and drunk and stumbling home on a high after an afterparty for their comeback. Jihoon looked up at him then, looked at the way the streetlight illuminated his chopped blond hair like a halo, looked at the way Jeonghan's lips were curled up into the ghost of a fond smile just for him, and thinks, it isn't hard.





	die for you, live for you

**Author's Note:**

> Quick heads-up: although the tag says demisexual!Jihoon, it isn't actually anything that comes up in the story because 1) Jihoon doesn't even know it himself, and 2) it isn't particularly relevant to the story. It's just how I see him as a character.
> 
> Inspired by [this post](http://leejhs.tumblr.com/post/160882717752/jh-hello-wz-soft-mode-activated).

Jihoon will never be able to pinpoint when exactly he started falling for Jeonghan. Maybe it was when he first came into the green room, shy and quiet, a little like himself. Maybe it was later on, when his hair grew out and his voice grew strong, matching the melodies Jihoon crafted. Maybe it was no moment at all, just fell for him in the nameless, timeless spaces between stages and filmings and practices.

 

Jeonghan was beautiful in ways he couldn't describe. He's written countless of songs since he first stumbled into Pledis, but never once could he articulate how the sunset would sometimes cast shadows across the plane of Jeonghan's face as they drove along the Han river and blaze on the high points of his cheekbones. He could never put together a beat that mirrored the irregularities in his heartbeat when hearing Jeonghan laugh at something he had said.

So he tries other ways. He says it in the way he would melt under Jeonghan's touch, turn soft and pliant where he would usually stiffen and shrink into himself. He says it in the warmth of his gaze, revolving around Jeonghan like the earth to the sun, connected by a force strong enough to tie planets to one another. He says it in the weight of his body draped against (or beside or behind or on top of) Jeonghan's, regardless of who's watching, of who cares.

He thinks Jeonghan gets it. Jeonghan has that way about him, has so much empathy for the people around him that you never really need to tell him how you're feeling, he'll just know. Jeonghan lets him fiddle with his hair, no matter how long or short it is. He plays with Jihoon's fingers -- and ass when he's particularly cheeky on stage -- as quiet reassurance. He knows when to crack a joke to lighten the mood when recording is going particularly difficult or when to stay quiet beside him and give him the stability he needs. So yeah, Jihoon thinks he gets it.

Except, he doesn't really, because Jeonghan loves Jihoon so much, would take a bullet for him any day. But he would do the same for every other member of Seventeen.

Jihoon doesn't resent that. It’s not like he was any different. But sometimes, when the sun starts to rise and Jihoon is still stuck at the company trying to write a goddamn verse about some non-existent girl in his non-existent love life, it gets a little too hard pretending like the person he wishes he's writing about isn't asleep at their dorms at that very moment.

 

Jeonghan once asked him how he writes all these love songs when he's never been truly in love. They had been tired and drunk and stumbling home on a high after an afterparty for their comeback. Jihoon looked up at him then, looked at the way the streetlight illuminated his chopped blond hair like a halo, looked at the way Jeonghan's lips were curled up into the ghost of a fond smile just for him, and thinks, _it isn't hard_.

 

There are many truths Jihoon could tell you about Jeonghan.

Jeonghan likes cute things. Jeonghan loves his family, Seventeen, and Carats, in that order. Jeonghan can't sleep when the room is too warm. Jeonghan worries and worries and worries. Jeonghan knows he's good looking and great at fanservice, but sometimes still doubts his singing abilities. Jeonghan cries watching romance movies.

Jeonghan is straight.

Sure, he plays it up for the fans, for the cameras, for the shits and giggles. Lets Mingyu lean in way too close pretending to vampire-bite his neck. Places almost-kisses on Seungcheol's lips. Unabashedly flirts with Jisoo in front of cameras. But that doesn't change the one constant fact: Jeonghan has never been and never will be into boys.

But even if he wasn't, if Jeonghan genuinely loved men, could love men, Jihoon would never have had a chance anyway. Jeonghan likes cute things. He likes Seungkwan and Seokmin, people that are filled to the brim with purity and innocent kindness. He likes Jisoo, who is soft-spoken and gentle and the same age. Jihoon may be one of his brothers, one of many on the list of people Jeonghan would gladly die for, but he's snippy and short-tempered and holds himself strongly enough that no one looks hard enough for the cracks. He may be small, but everyone around him knows he is anything but cute.

He's made peace with it. He knows he'll never even get to call Jeonghan his best friend, let alone anything else. The truth of it has settled around the infatuation (he doesn't dare call it anything else) like a blanket of snow, muffling the brightness of his feelings, keeping it buried and hidden from view.

(Of course, when snow touches something raw and exposed, the only thing that it brings is pain, and then numbness.)

 

He clutches the secret close to him, a jagged rock against his chest. He's a practical man, can easily compartmentalise and separate his heart from his head. It isn't the greatest difficulty to keep it quiet and tucked away where no one could ever come close to finding it. It's much better this way after all. No one wants to hear about the gay idol producer, pining for a person he could never have.

 

There is the before-moving and after-moving. Before-moving was the noona, the one with soft cheeks and dark hair cascading down her back. He had been too young then to understand the intricate dances of a relationship, what it means to flirt or pursue or win. He just knew the fluttery feeling in his stomach when she cheered for him at his baseball games, only understood the urge to make himself seem cooler in front of her. She would always be his first love, his greatest what-if.

Then there is the after-moving. After-moving was sleepless nights practicing and practicing and practicing. It was learning to dance and discovering producing and integrating himself into Pledis Boys, and then Tempest, and then Seventeen. It was watching people come and go from those green rooms, the only thing keeping him from following was the years he would have wasted if he had quit then.

Seoul was busy and modern and loud, polar opposite to the small town he grew up in in Busan. Where in Busan he had time to daydream about what the noona may have been doing while he was stuck in math class, in Seoul he barely had time to kept himself fed and slightly-rested between the hours of school and training. Where in Busan he could nervously contemplate whether or not to hold her hand as they walked home together, in Seoul he only shuffled from one concrete building to another, earbuds in and head full of song lyrics and choreographies.

And yet.

He found himself with the same fluttery feeling in his stomach. He had the same urge to make himself cooler. Bumzu hyung calls him out on it once, teasing him for obviously having favourites. Jihoon yells over him for Jeonghan to go again, but hours later when they finish for the day, he still feels like he had been stripped naked and shoved under a spotlight in front of hundreds of people.

He crawled into Jeonghan's bed that night, half-heartedly mumbling something about being too lazy to climb up to his bed. Jeonghan just silently scoots over to make space for him before falling right back to sleep. Jihoon watches the rise and fall of Jeonghan's chest, lets himself have this, feels the tears silently well up and tip over the brim of his lashes. He falls asleep worn out and shaky, but clearer than he had been in a long time.

 

There is a quote in a book, and it says, "Things change. And friends leave. Life doesn't stop for anybody." Jihoon understands that better than most. He understood it when he moved to Seoul, left everything he knew behind to pursue the most dangerous game of chance. He understood it when he came back and the noona was gone, never even left a number he could call. He understood it when he woke up the next morning after that night, as he leans against Seungcheol at breakfast and laughs at something Chan says. He makes eye contact with Jeonghan as they laugh and his heart stutters at the private smile they share, but it is buried under a blanket of snow, and life will keeping going, and spring will come soon enough.


End file.
